A San Francisco supervisor’s proposal aims to address supermarkets closing in the city and the price of groceries climbing.

Supervisor Bilal Mahmoud introduced the Affordable Groceries Act at Tuesday’s San Francisco Board of Supervisors meeting. The proposal borrows an idea from New York’s mayor, but with a local flavor.

“It could be partnering with a food bank to take over one of these vacant lots,” Mahmoud said of his proposal. “Or it could be buying the property and giving it to a grocery, at lower market, which is what Mamdani is doing in New York.”

Inflation has pushed supermarket prices up by about 3% compared to last year.

Adding to the affordability issues are new rules implemented in April by the Trump administration for SNAP, which is called CalFresh in the Bay Area. Many are expected not to qualify under the new rules.

Meanwhile, a combination of factors have prompted some big name grocers to close their doors in San Francisco.

Safeway in the Fillmore neighborhood closed in February of last year. In November, the Lucky Supermarket in the Bayview neighborhood shuttered.

There are community activists who said the two closures have created a bit of a food desert in those neighborhoods.

Mahmoud’s proposal would address the two problems by incentivizing grocers and pharmacy operators to open new outlets in the city through streamlining the approval process. It would also penalize outlets that close stores by taxing operators that shutter them and still hand on to the leases, which keeps new operators from moving in.

The proposal would then use those funds to open city-backed grocery stores.

Mahmoud said he has modeled his proposal with local markets that also accept vouchers from EatSF in mind. The whole idea is to provide access to all residents — regardless of income — to healthy food in their neighborhoods.

Tanis Crosby, executive director of the San Francisco-Marin Food Bank, said food insecurity is worse now than during the pandemic.

“The reality is that here in the Bay Area, cost of living is really high,” Crosby said. “So it’s really important that we look towards what are the solutions we can take. Because it’s not about insufficient food that creates insecurity, it’s policy.”

If the proposal is passed by the Board of Supervisors, it would be put on November’s general election ballot.

Voters would have to approve the streamlining and tax idea, and the fund for city-backed grocers.

Streetsblog has migrated to a new comment system. New commenters can register directly in the comments section of any article. Returning commenters: your previous comments and display name have been preserved, but you’ll need to reclaim your account by clicking “Forgot your password?” on the sign-in form, entering your email, and following the verification link to set a new password — this is required because passwords could not be carried over during the migration. For questions, contact tips@streetsblog.org.

SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. (KGO) — Dozens of apparent shopping carts are stuck in a marsh along the San Francisco Bay. And residents are puzzled as to how they got there.

“It’s crazy! Gross!” said Kim Avalos, who frequents the trail. “What is that?!”

The San Francisco Bay Trail in South San Francisco curves around the mouth of the Colma Creek marsh. It’s a popular walking and running trail, but local residents are starting to notice something in the water.

“Now that I’m looking at… wow…there’s actually so many shopping carts out here,” said Avalos. “There’s an extreme amount.”

Avalos works for a nearby garbage company. She says she walks the trail every day but has never seen anything like this.

“It’s actually kind of insane to think about how they even got there,” Avalos said.

It’s the same story for others who frequent the trail. At first glance, mistaking the debris for rocks until they actually stare at it.

“It kind of blends in,” said Hondres when we approached him on the trail. “I’ve never seen grocery carts out in the Bay like this… I don’t know, it’s kind of weird.”

“Have you noticed it before?” 7 On Your Side’s Stephanie Sierra asked another passer-by.

“Uh… no. This is kind of new,” he said. “Someone is being very stupid… I’ve seen them over the years. I don’t remember there being this many. There’s quite a few.”

Many people who frequent the trail said when it’s high tide it’s hard to notice anything.

“It does look like shopping carts, do you know if that’s what it is?”

It’s hard to say for sure. But at low tide, it certainly looks that way.

“It does look like shopping carts, amongst other things,” Save the Bay representative Josh Quigley said.

And there’s not just one or two, but there’s what appears to be dozens of them spanning the Colma Creek marsh adjacent to the bay.

“Have you ever seen this many shopping carts along the bay?” Stephanie Sierra asked.

“I have not, no,” Quigley said. “This is certainly the greater concentration that I’ve ever seen in one place.”

Quigley is the Senior Policy Manager for Save the Bay, an environmental nonprofit founded in 1961 to stop excessive filling of the San Francisco Bay.

“I think it’s really unfortunate… the bay is treated not as the jewel and resource that it should be, but as a dumping ground,” Quigley said.

So, where is it all coming from? That seems to be up for debate.

“It could be a big prank, if anything, but at this rate I have no idea,” said Alvin Lau, who visits the trail regularly.

“There’s often homeless people in the mobile RV vehicles,” said another. “There’s always a lot of trash here, not going to lie.”

“I don’t know, maybe Costco. They are our neighbors,” Kim Avalos said. “Could be because they do look bigger.”

A Costco Business Center is about a mile from Colma Marsh. 7 On Your Side reached out to Costco’s corporate office, and the South San Francisco Costco General Manager said: “We walk and clean the trail multiple times a week, in addition to checking for any carts that might end up in the bay.”

The goal now is to clean it out — and ensure it stays that way.

“Stop being dumb. There’s only one planet we got, so take care of it,” said Lau.

“It hurts me as an animal lover to see all these shopping carts in their place of habitat,” Avalos said.

“Save the Bay” says overall pollution is decreasing across the bay shoreline, but there are instances–like this one–where smaller pockets need to be addressed.

Locally, there are regulations in place to prevent this type of pollution.

7 On Your Side contacted the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board to further investigate and clean up the area.

Take a look at more stories and videos by 7 On Your Side.

7OYS’s consumer hotline is a free consumer mediation service for those in the San Francisco Bay Area. We assist individuals with consumer-related issues; we cannot assist on cases between businesses, or cases involving family law, criminal matters, landlord/tenant disputes, labor issues, or medical issues. Please review our FAQ here. As a part of our process in assisting you, it is necessary that we contact the company / agency you are writing about. If you do not wish us to contact them, please let us know right away, as it will affect our ability to work on your case. If we are able to assist you, we will reach back out.